


Murderer

by schrodanger



Series: The Three of Swords - Prompts and Other Stories [3]
Category: Dragon Age, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Nightmares, Other, PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-13
Updated: 2015-09-13
Packaged: 2018-04-20 15:40:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4793063
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/schrodanger/pseuds/schrodanger
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Seldras Lavellan struggles with guilt of losing her clan. SFW, rated mature for violence</p>
            </blockquote>





	Murderer

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt - “What? The hell was that sound? What the fuck is that sound?”  
> It was originally going to be something funny, but I decided I wanted to explore a more serious side of Seldras’s personality. Warning for death, zombie-like shit, overall creepiness. Guilt and vivid nightmares are something she struggles with. I decided to tackle both in this prompt.   
> Done in present tense as opposed to past tense like my other works. (This was the first Dragon Age related short I did, written in July.)

“What? The shit was that sound? What the fuck is that sound?”

Solas stops along the path, giving Seldras a look of parental disdain and asking, “Is such language really necessary, lethallan?”

Declan snorts and leans on his staff. “She called me the elvhen for ‘wolf dick’ when she was three. This is hardly the worst of it.”

Sera giggles so hard that she has to rely on a nearby tree for support. “Wolf dick, huh Inky? You should teach me some of that elfy swearin’ shite one d-”

“Shh!” Seldras hisses in a low voice, drawing her daggers and grabbing the hilts with shaking hands. “Don’t you hear that?”

“Hear what?” asks Blackwall, crossing his arms and scanning the landscape.

“Don’t hear nothin’,” Sera comments.

“I’m serious! Quiet everyone.” Her bright green eyes dart from side to side, ears perked and breathing barely audible. Hearing the fear in her voice, the party obeys her command and falls quiet. Solas and Declan ready their staves, fingers crackling with magic. Blackwall stands with his shield raised, muscles tense underneath worn armor. Sera knocks an arrow in her bow, shifting uneasily.

The eery silence of the Exalted Plains hums in Seldras’s ears, permeating her consciousness deeper than the roar of any beast she’s hunted. The wind doesn’t blow. No bird chirps, no wolf howls, no halla bleats. Her heart pounds unevenly in her chest, her breathing becoming shallow and strained.

Something is very wrong.

“We’re in danger. We should go back to c-”

She’s interrupted by the gurgling choke of Blackwall. The Warden clutches at his throat and claws at the arrow embedded in his spurting jugular.

“ _Fenedhis!_ Blackwall! Solas, get him! Everyone down!” Her lips form words that make no sound. She tries to shout louder, but all her vocal cords can manage are mute gasps.

Even without hearing Seldras’s warning, Solas instinctively darts to Blackwall , healing magic crackling in his hands. He never reaches him before he falls to the dirt, dead eyes staring in shock at the sky. Sera frantically shoots arrows at an enemy that she cannot see. Declan attempts to create a barrier around the party.

They’re all around them. Humanoid shadows, hordes of them glowing with an energy familiar in a way Seldras can’t place. She doesn’t have time to think. Her warning shrieks fall on deaf ears, echoing in her own mind but never reaching her companions.

Solas is the second to fall, clutching his chest in silent horror as a hail of arrows pierce his leather armor. Declan cries out and leaps to his side, only to be silenced by a blade of crimson slicing through his stomach. Sera drops her bow and grasps Seldras’s arm, cursing in horror and ready to run. She is immediately grabbed by the neck and silenced with the flick of ghostly wrist.

Seldras, no longer able to scream, turns to run. Three arrows pierce her spine. Her mouth hangs open in silent horror and pain. She falls helplessly on her stomach, unable to move her legs. She reaches behind her back, trying to find the arrows impaling bone and flesh, but her fingers touch nothing. Black spots dance before her eyes. She crawls forward with her arms, the pool of blood growing darker around her.

Footsteps. Uneven, ragged. She looks up through dying vision, expecting the shadows to materialize into bandits, red templars, venatori, but…

It’s them.

Her clan, shambling corpses, skin pulled back over their skulls in sadistic, eternal grimaces. They spit and sneer at her, cursing her in raspy elvhen that their decaying vocal cords shouldn’t even be able to process.

“Lethallan…” rattles a familiar figure in elaborate robes. The Keeper, barely recognizeable in undeath save for her piercing blue eyes, still intact in their sockets. She stares at Seldras an unblinking, unforgiving gaze.

“Harellan.”

Traitor.

_-“Sel.”-_

The Keeper leans in, drawing a rusted, blood coated dagger from the sheath on her bony, naked hip.

“Dalem'an.”

Murderer…

_-“Sel, Inky, wake up!”-_

“Dalem'an.” A chant. They’re all staring at her now, repeating the phrase in gravely monotone.

The blade is pressed against her throat. She clenches her eyes shut, tears rolling down blood-caked cheeks.

“Dalem'an. Harellan. Dalem'an, dalem'an, dalem'an-”

_-“Shite, Inky please, please wake up!”-_

Rusted metal carves into her throat. For a split second, everything is whispering blackness.

Seldras opens her eyes.

The Exalted Plains are gone. In its place is a blurred, familiar bedroom, too bright and too warm.

She chokes back bile and gasps for air. Slender, warm arms squeeze her tight. “Please be okay,” comes Sera’s frantic and desperate voice from above her.

A dream…all a dream.

She looks up at Sera weakly, tears burning in her eyes. The migraine pulsing in her skull threatens to shove her back into unconsciousness.

She tries to say Sera’s name, but a ragged sob comes out instead. Sera holds her too tightly and rocks a little. “S'alright,” she sniffles. She kisses Seldras’s cheek, her own face damp with tears. “S'alright, okay? No more cryin’. Stop cryin’. None of it’s real, it’s all…all shit, okay. I’m here. I’ll – I’ll get your medicine in a sec, yeah? Can I just hold you?”

Seldras nods weakly and rests her cheek against Sera’s shoulder. She squeezes her eyes shut and lets out a quivering breath.

_Dalem'an..._  

**Author's Note:**

> I’m not sure if Dalem’an means murderer. I took cues from Project Elvhen and roughly translated something that I thought would mean “Killer of one’s kin.” In the dream, Clan Lavellan is accusing Seldras of killing them. This is a projection of her guilt about being unable to prevent the clan’s death


End file.
